I get asked occasionally a question that challenges me to come up with a concise answer. One of them came today from a friend who asked: What does it feel like … to be in your particular place right now?

My friend was referring to my impending move from Amarillo to Fairview.

After thinking for a total of about, oh, three seconds, the concise answer came to me: I feel as though I am having an out-of-body experience.

Why? My wife and I have no particular intermediate- or long-term plans waiting to be executed once we make the move. We are free to do whatever we want, or not do something. The “body” I am looking at in this out-of-body state is my former self.

It’s the body that for decades carried me from one job to the next, or from one task to the next one.

The move that’s coming up in a few days will lead us to a life we haven’t yet charted out precisely. All we know for certain is that we have found a dwelling where we intend to stay. The immediate task awaiting us involves unpacking boxes and rediscovering possessions that have been stashed in a warehouse for the past seven months.

We’ve done this before. The most recent time occurred when we took possession of our newly built house in Amarillo; it was just before Christmas 1996 and it provided a joyous experience looking at possessions that had been stored away for nearly two years. That was a memorable Christmas, indeed.

After we unpack the boxes now? Beats me, man.

Therefore, our retirement journey is leading us to that proverbial fork in the road. As Yogi Berra once supposedly said, we plan to “take it” — wherever it leads.

Once we do, I suspect that’s when the out-of-body experience will end and I’ll be whole once again.